AquaEuroUSA Classic 400 skimmer club - Page 17

steve414 · #**401** 08/19/2007, 11:35 AM

Sounds good kodyboy

luke33 · #**402** 08/19/2007, 12:01 PM

Kody, what pump's are you going to put on it.

kodyboy · #**403** 08/19/2007, 05:26 PM

right now I just have the second batch of king 480 to put on it, but I do have a catalina 2200 that almost fits so I might meshmod that too. I want to see what the stock pumps do with the new plumbing first, and then hope I did it right

jglackin · #**404** 08/19/2007, 06:09 PM

I have finally been using my skimmer for about a week and I have been pulling a good amount of goop out of the tank. If a mod or different pumps will make it draw more, I am certainly open for it. Are you people using the aquabees saying that the difference is significant enough to scrap the Kings and get the AB?

JRaquatics · #**405** 08/19/2007, 07:03 PM

I had the aquabee on it with the stock and mesh modded. Couldn't get it any higher than 6-7 scfh. The king pulls 10 scfh stock. So I put the king back on. The only benefit with the aquabee is that it pulls more air than water. I plan on modding the Newly sent king pump with a custom venturi.

kodyboy · #**406** 08/19/2007, 09:10 PM

I meant king 590s, not 480s.

pancho · #**407** 08/20/2007, 05:38 PM

I recieved replacement pumps sometime in June and there was no exposed steel to the naked eye. I installed the pumps thinking the problem was solved. Boy was I wrong. My reef was not doing very well and I lost about $300 worth of fish. All my corals survived. I decided to inspect my replacement pumps and found rust on all three pumps. I also tested my water and everything was in check. I will not be using any of these band aided pumps ever again. AE needs to provide different pumps to their customers that will not poison their tank.

HaroldT · #**408** 08/20/2007, 06:30 PM

Of my original pumps I got in February, only one had rust. I put an AquaMend epoxy on it ($3.45 at home depot) and it took care of it.

luke33 · #**409** 08/20/2007, 07:07 PM

If you go to the chemistry forums some of the old school reefers keep screws in there sumps to keep rust for a benefit. I'm sure to much rust is deadly, but the small amts i see on those pump's unless you have a very small tank less tahn a 20g I would think its affects are fairly harmless. However i would remove the pump's anyhow. I have a pump in my tank with minimal rust and i'm not to worried about it. It has not had any affect on my reef.

kodyboy · #**410** 08/20/2007, 07:07 PM

speaking of rust I pulled out my genx8500 and good God tons of it! I am telling you this is getting annoying. This had nothing to do with AE by the way

On another not so far my modded AE400 is doing well, a little more than 90% of the chamber is filled with fine purple bubbles and it looks awesome. The water is also swirling nicely, don't know if that is a good or bad thing, but it is swirling. I will post pics when hell freezes ov......... ASAP

Of course we shall see if I get any skimmate production

jglackin · #**411** 08/20/2007, 08:44 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by pancho
I recieved replacement pumps sometime in June and there was no exposed steel to the naked eye. I installed the pumps thinking the problem was solved. Boy was I wrong. My reef was not doing very well and I lost about $300 worth of fish. All my corals survived. I decided to inspect my replacement pumps and found rust on all three pumps. I also tested my water and everything was in check. I will not be using any of these band aided pumps ever again. AE needs to provide different pumps to their customers that will not poison their tank.

That's what I was talking about with the pumps I got. The metal was "covered", but the edges did not appear to be covered. It only takes a very tiny amount to be exposed and then the rust goes to town on it.

I will keep an eye on them, but I don't have time to waste on this anymore. I am going to use what I have and move on. If they become a problem, I will replace them on my own dime and write this off to experience. I believe that AE has done just about all that they can do. We got screwed, they got screwed, and that is about it.

hahnmeister · #**412** 08/20/2007, 09:06 PM

Aquabees for everyone!!!

jglackin · #**413** 08/20/2007, 09:12 PM

Where did you buy your Aquabees?

pancho · #**414** 08/20/2007, 09:23 PM

Do the Aquabees come with a venturi?

luke33 · #**415** 08/20/2007, 09:29 PM

Screw the aquabees, get some QO's. Much much cheaper.

nait002 · #**416** 08/29/2007, 07:25 PM

whats a QO luke?

hahnmeister · #**417** 08/29/2007, 07:30 PM

Quiet One by Pentair. The Quiet One 3000 is pretty much the same 40 watt pump as the Sicce PSK 2500 that ATI uses to get 1000lph on the Bubblemasters. They are cheaper ($40-60 online most places), and actually have a 1" MPT outlet which should make them even more capable as threadwheel pumps.

They are a good idea, but would require major redesign or modding to work. The Aquabees would be direct replacements for the existing AquaKing POS's.

luke33 · #**418** 08/29/2007, 08:13 PM

Major work as in adding mesh and hooking them on as they are 3/4" output's. The QO4000 will pull 35scfh with a 1/4" hose fitting and 1/4" hose on it, thats all. So the $40 looks much nicer than the 125 dollar sicce. I have a sicce suprema(QO4000) and i boared out the volute inlet a bit and i'm getting 40scfh stock. Haven't even put mesh on it yet, so i'm guessing 50ish and thats just with a 3/4" fitting(sicce has a 3/4") So i think its a great pump for the job. But i'm not sure if the neck on this guy can handle that much air.......i know it can't.

hahnmeister · #**419** 08/29/2007, 11:02 PM

Is it the pressure rated 4000 with 3/4" outlet, or the non with 1" outlet?

luke33 · #**420** 08/30/2007, 07:21 AM

The HH QO4000 is 3/4" both and the normal is 1" inlet and 3/4" outlet. So the sicce i have is like the HH 4000. I would think the 1" QO would do even better. But there both 3/4" outlet's which would work fine with the skimmer. And they are pretty small pump's as well so you should have a pretty easy fit.

Paulairduck · #**421** 08/30/2007, 07:58 AM

I have been reading this for a while, Aqua Euro must have spent a truckload on pumps, three sets, they deffinitely need to fix it right, instead of using bandaid's from the 99 cents store

HoopsGuru · #**422** 08/30/2007, 06:19 PM

I ran my original pumps until they had thick coatings of rust on them, I mean you could not really visualize what the metal plate was supposed to look like on the back. Other than some extra nuisance algae, there were zero lives lost from corals, fish, and/or invertebrates. I'm not going to get into a debate over why fish died in a tank we can't test, but I don't believe anyone needs to lose sleep that their livestock is going to die overnight....rust just would not do that (corals would be most at risk).

As stated by Kodyboy, other pumps are having problems with rust, probably ever more widespread than we know since checking them isn't done by the majority of hobbyists. It isn't easy just to jump to another manufacturer, but I am hoping that maybe by the turn of the year new pumps will be on the new models, and available for the ones already purchased. Other retailers are now carrying the line, so they must be confident they have the problem handled. I was the only one for quite some time.

HaroldT · #**423** 08/30/2007, 06:54 PM

I really like this skimmer. I am surprised so many people want to mod. It works great out of the box.

HoopsGuru · #**424** 08/30/2007, 07:29 PM

I think it's just human nature. I am also into RC planes and such and people cannot help but to tinker with almost every model they bring home even if it works well from the box. Insert the old "Tim the Toolman" grunt where necessary to define the ever needed increase in power, features, etc.

Unfortunately, I think this does lend the idea to a lot of people that it doesn't skim very well. But, there are plenty of videos, at least in the beginning here, that can help folks see what it does from the box...I am also very pleased with its stock peformance (aside from the exposed metal issue). Maybe I should take a new one since they have been buried for some time....

HoopsGuru · #**425** 09/12/2007, 07:37 PM

Unfortunate news, the wholesale price is going up by almost 30%. For the Classic 400, this will be a price of around $302 + shipping at my typical markup. The good news is that they are actively looking for a new "plug and play" replacement pump.